BFO93LA044 · Cessna 182J
Para Power Cessna 182J · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during takeoff
From 01B to 01B
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO93LA044
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Cessna 182J
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 182
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N3035F
- Operator
- Para Power
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 01BTo 01B
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Takeoff
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Total loss of engine power (non-mechanical)
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Fuel contamination
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Fluid, fuel › Contamination
- Fuel system, cap › Leak
- Fuel system, tank › Distorted
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, compliance with ad, not followed
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Putnam, CT, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
SHORTLY AFTER TAKEOFF AT AN ALTITUDE OF ABOUT 50 FT, THE ENGINE LOST POWER. DURING AN EMERGENCY LANDING, THE AIRPLANE CLIPPED SOME TREES, TOUCHED DOWN IN A FIELD, AND SLID UNTIL IT IMPACTED A ROW OF TREES. AN ON SCENE INVESTIGATION REVEALED ABOUT ONE QUART OF WATER IN THE FUEL SYSTEM. EXAMINATION OF THE FUEL TANK FILLER NECKS REVEALED CORROSION. THE RIGHT TANK FUEL FILLER NECK ALSO HAD PITTING. WHEN TESTED, THE RIGHT FUEL CAP AND SEAL AREA ALLOWED LEAKAGE OF AN UNDETERMINABLE AMOUNT OF WATER. EXAMINATION OF THE FUEL TANK BLADDERS REVEALED WRINKLES. THE AIRPLANE'S MAINTENANCE RECORDS INDICATED THAT AD 84-10-01 AND AD 83-13-01, REGARDING INSPECTION OF THE FUEL FILLER NECK AND SEAL AREA AND THE FUEL TANKS, WERE NOT PERFORMED DURING THE LAST INSPECTION. THE AIRPLANE WAS KEPT OUTSIDE AND IT HAD NOT BEEN FLOWN FOR SEVERAL DAYS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT. SNOW HAD FALLEN ON THE PREVIOUS DAY. THE PILOT SAID HE DID A THOROUGH PREFLIGHT, WHICH INCLUDED DRAINING THE FUEL TANKS AND CHECKING FOR CONTAMINATION, BUT NO CONTAMINATION WAS EVIDENT.
Probable cause
INADEQUATE COMPLIANCE WITH APPLICABLE AIR WORTHINESS DIRECTIVES, LEAKY FUEL CAP SEAL, WATER CONTAMINATION OF THE FUEL, AND WRINKLES IN THE FUEL TANK BLADDERS THAT INTERFERED WITH THE ABILITY TO DRAIN WATER FROM THE TANKS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO93LA044
- Event ID
- 20001211X11920
- Case number
- BFO93LA044
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 309f251bce328bae66b20c2d3d5b2bec1b0564a476016af3d70769f2929990de; retrieved 2026-09-21T14:31:34.574Z.